SC Chief Justice Toal Lays Down the Gauntlet

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SC Chief Justice Toal Lays Down the Gauntlet During Interview on ETV's "The Big Picture" Airing Thurs., Feb. 14 at 7:30 p.m. Says She's Done All She Can to Maximize Court Efficiency Using Fed. Money, "Now It's Time for the Legislature to Step-Up"

Announces New Automation System Will Prevent Recurrence of Scoring Problems on Bar Exams

For Immediate Release
February 13, 2008

Columbia, SC... During an interview with ETV's Andrew Gobeil Tuesday, South Carolina Chief Justice Jean Toal challenged the legislature to provide her with the funds necessary to hire more judges to reduce the caseload.

The interview, taped the day before Toal's delivery of her "State of the Judiciary Address," will air on ETV's "The Big Picture" on Thursday, Feb. 14 at 7:30 p.m.

When asked why petitioning the legislature for funding to increase the number of judges would have a different outcome this year, compared with the previous legislative session when the same request was made, Toal said, "I think the governmental process moves slowly. I think increased discussion has made the General Assembly more aware. They have committees that have begun to look at this issue. I feel pretty confident that I'll get what I'm asking for on the family-court side this year. Circuit is a little more of a question mark. But, I think the legislature knows how desperately we need these judges. I think it's a question of priority."

In response to Gobeil's follow-up question, "Is that your top priority as you address legislators?" Toal responded in the affirmative and said that during her tenure, she has worked towards making the court system as efficient as possible, without using state monies. She said they are currently in the process of rolling out, "a Web-based case management system...(that) has mostly been based on federal grants and non-state money. So, I've done the best I could to maximize what I'm doing managerially, and from a business process point of view, to make the system as efficient as I can, primarily using non-state revenue dollars. Now it's time for the legislature to step up."

At another point during the interview, when discussing how she plans to ensure there won't be a grading problem recurrence with bar exams, similar to what ensued in 2007, Toal said, "We are going to do a variety of things. Fortunately, we are now starting to automate the bar-examination process. As you know, automation has been a big signature piece of my administration as chief. This process will be automated, so that this will not happen again-this kind of reporting, or scrivener's error. And we will put additional safeguards in effect to be sure it doesn't happen. But more broadly, this issue has also brought to the fore a discussion of how we examine and how we discipline lawyers and judges. The American Bar Association has a component within it that gives technical advice to states about their disciplinary process. I had, way before this controversy, put my name on the list for South Carolina to receive this technical advice and we will have a technical team in this spring that will take a look at our situation. My idea is that any system you have in government is always open to examination and re-thinking. And I don't fear that, I encourage it. But we'll take a good look with some good objective advice from experts and see if there are things we need to do to improve our system."

Finally, when the diehard USC sports fan was asked, "How are the Gamecocks looking?" Toal answered, "Well, you know, it's hard to be a Gamecock sometimes. But, I remain very loyal and always very optimistic about my Gamecocks."

Contact: Catherine Christman at (803) 737-3259 or christman@scetv.org.